An Angel for Bishop

"I don't think so," she replied.

"Have you eaten peanut butter before? Do you like it?" Dan asked.

"Yes, I love peanut butter but I've never had it on toast," she said.

Dan shook off the tremble that crept up his back. He needed to know more about her to prevent something like this from happening again. He saw the notepad was still on the table. He carried the herbal teas to the table then brought Willow her peanut butter toast.

She looked at him when she saw he didn't have any toast in front of him.

"You need the calories. I'll wait for dinner," he said with a smile.

Willow carefully picked up her toast and took a small bite. When the warm peanut butter hit her tongue a broad smile spread across her face. "I LOVE peanut butter toast!" she gushed. She took a few more bites.

He grinned at her delight and picked up the notepad. After a sip of his tea he looked at Willow and asked "I hope you don't mind but I'd like to see how much more of your history we can fill in." She continued to munch on the toast and sip at the tea but gave him a nod.

"Do you recall the name of the man Percy, uh, took you from?" He still felt weird saying that.

"Herman Denk. He was a doctor. He gave me my new tits and fixed me so I couldn't make babies or have a period." she said.

Dan's stomach clenched. She said it like it was nothing but Dan was grateful to Percy for having killed the bastard who butchered Willow for his own needs and enjoyment. He took a deep breath and wrote down the Doctor's name and the approximate year he died. "Do you recall how long you lived with Herman? How many winters or summers?" he asked her next.

Willow looked confused then sad. "Herman lived in Las Vegas and I stayed inside in my room most of the time when he wasn't taking me out to parties. I don't remember how long that was but I think I stayed with him the longest. Before we moved to Las Vegas we were in Florida. That's where he poisoned and killed Officer Warren Greggs and took me from him. Officer Greggs used his handcuffs on me a lot and beat me because I wasn't worthy of having sex with him. That's where these scars came from." She showed him the rough white ridges encircling both of her wrists. Obviously the cuffs had done some serious damage to her skin at that time as the scar tissue was extensive. "He kept me chained in a room in his basement. When I got sick Officer Greggs brought Herman to fix me. We moved to Las Vegas after Officer Greggs was dead."

Dan was feeling a little queasy but while Willow was feeling talkative he'd get the information from her. As long as he had names and knew they had died he could find their obituaries and work out a timeline from that. He jotted down some notes and nodded at Willow to continue.

"Madam Tallia was my Mistress before Officer Greggs took me from her. She lived in a big old house in Georgia. She was angry a lot. She had been hurt in a car accident and she lost her eye. She wore a fancy eye patch but her mouth was so cruel. She told me I looked just like the bitch who destroyed her beauty. She would tie me up and burn my arms and legs with her cigarettes." Willow pointed out a few of the older circular scars running up her arms. "She told me that she was saving my face for later. I was always terrified that she was going to burn my face. Officer Greggs was at one of her parties. He found me tied up in my bedroom and put me in the trunk of his car. He told me he burned Mistress Tallia's house down with her inside."

Willow took a long sip of her tea to moisten her throat as she was unaccustomed to talking for so long.

"Mistress Tallia got me from Mr. Bill who brought me to one of her parties. Mistress Tallia called him Buffalo Bill because she said he was from that 'miserable place'. She told me that she wasn't going to give me back to Mr. Bill. She told me she gave him poisoned heroin so he wouldn't come back to get me the morning after the party and he didn't so I guess he's dead. When I was with Mr. Bill we moved around a lot and we lived out of his car. I don't remember his last name. Sometimes he gave me drugs and I would forget things. He loaned me out to people who gave him drugs and took me to lots of sex parties. I think Mr. Bill bought me from my mom's boyfriend when she died." Willow's voice ran out at that point. It was the longest Dan had ever heard her speak and while the subject matter was horrific to him, he was so glad that he got her story. He could work with this.

"Do you remember your mom's name?" he asked gently. She thought about it then shook her head sadly.

"Do you remember how old you were when your mom died?" he asked.

Willow sat quietly for a minute thinking. "I remember... a tenth birthday party. I think it was shortly after that when some men came to the house looking for mom's boyfriend. I was playing outside but I heard them yelling 'where is he'. When they left I went inside and she was dead. When her boyfriend got home he took me with him in the car and we drove away. He met Mr. Bill at a truck stop on the highway and sold me to him."

Dan sat looking at Willow. He couldn't breathe. His chest felt tight. Her mother was murdered when she was 10 and she was immediately sold off into the sex trade and slavery? How could that NOT screw you up? He opened his arms and Willow was immediately curled up on his lap and in his arms. They sat like that for quite a while, just holding each other and rocking gently. It gave Dan time to think. He felt completely inadequate for the task of healing Willow. He knew he could love her and was surprised that he was already starting to feel that way towards her. He reminded himself that they'd only met the day before and there'd been a lot of intense emotion involved in that short time. Before he started throwing words like love around he needed to get some perspective. Difficult to get when her soft body was clinging to him.

Based on her account she'd been held captive by five people and had been raped and tortured multiple times by them and raped by many others starting from a very early age. Now she was with him. Was she better off? He'd already had sex with her, multiple times in the very short time he'd known her. And he'd killed for her as they had. He was willing to grant that in his case at least it really had been kill or be killed and her life was at risk at the time. That said it was easy for him to see how similar he was to previous 'masters'. God, his skin crawled when he thought of himself in those terms. Maybe that was the difference? He didn't want to be her master. He wanted her to be a whole person. He wasn't sure that was going to be possible considering her past. But he knew he would do what he could to help her regain as much as she could. He felt so protective of her! He wasn't clear where that came from but it certainly didn't seem harmful to her so he felt ok about letting her see that.

The first thing he could do to help her was get her identity back. With the information he had an investigator should be able to connect the dots to get back to the start. Then he could get her birth certificate, then a passport, an identity. Maybe it was just his paranoia but he wanted a discreet investigation. There had been at least one police officer involved in her abduction and Percy's gang was not going to be too friendly to someone who killed one of their members. He was again over his head but he knew someone that could help.

"I could stay here all day holding you but I need to make a call and send a note. I have to report Percy's death to the police or things could get messy. And I have to contact Andrei Noskov, the man who owns this house, to ask a favor. I thought we'd cook up a frozen pizza for dinner tonight. Can I ask you to go to the walk-in freezer in the garage and pick one out? They're on the rack to the left and there should be a supreme on top but any will do." She stood and headed off to the garage.

Dan walked into the communications room and checked the signal strength. The storm seemed to be winding down but it still had the potential for affecting the line of sight antenna. He'd prefer not to use the satellite phone to contact the police as he wasn't sure how long he'd be on the line. He used the PC to dial up the nearest state police station and waited for someone to answer. He heard some weird stuttering on the line so he knew his connection was fairly weak. When someone finally answered he asked for Officer Benson or Officer Duncan as he'd met them and his instincts said they were OK. Not the best gauge but it was what he had. Benson was gone for the day but Duncan was just coming on shift so Dan was put through to his desk.

"Officer Duncan." He sounded tired.

"Hello, my name's Dan Bishop. I live at the Noskov Estate off Mountain Road 23 up on Peacemill Peak. I need to report a traffic accident, a shooting, and a fatality."

"Sorry, Mr. Bishop, this seems to be a bad line. Did you say a fatality?" Officer Duncan asked.

"Yes, a fatality. Sorry about the poor connection. The line of sight towers up here on the mountain are having some trouble with the storm."

"Can you give me the details before we lose our connection?" the officer asked. The connection must have sounded worse on his end.

"Sure. I was driving back to the house yesterday when that storm hit. I was just about back to the house when I noticed someone hung up on one of the trees hanging over the edge of the cliff. I stopped and went to see if I could help. There was a trike motorcycle on a ledge 50 feet down and a badly injured man. He'd gone through the guardrail. I tried to climb up to the woman stuck in the tree but the man woke up and started shooting at us. He shot at me and then he hit the woman twice. Once in the arm and once on the side of her helmet. I had to drop the broken guardrail on him to stop him from shooting her. He fell to the bottom of the gorge with his motorcycle. He's dead. Did you get all that?"

There was silence for a bit and Dan thought he'd lost the connection when Officer Duncan's voice came back on. "Yeah, I got it. Is there any access to that gorge?"

"I don't think so. It's very narrow and the river in it is pretty wild most of the year. I have a buddy with a Sikorsky cargo helicopter that might be able to lower someone with a line from above but it would be a long hairy ride down. Anyway, I can send you the GPS coordinates. I had the entire area mapped when we were building this place."

"What about the woman?" Officer Duncan asked.

"I got her back to the house before she froze to death and patched her wounds which appear to be pretty minor. She's suffering from malnutrition and her weight is very low. She may have some memory loss as she has been unable to recall her name. She did remember the name of the man she was with. Percy Jackson. From the marking I saw on his jacket I think he may have been a member of a motorcycle gang, maybe the Blood Brothers. I have no idea what he was doing trying to drive his bike up this mountain road in a snow storm. Makes no sense to me."

"Damn, that complicates things considerably. The Feds are going to want in on this. When can you come in for a statement?" the officer asked.

"In about four months," Dan replied.

"What?" came the shocked reply.

"Sorry, but the mountain road is closed for the season. It will remain blocked with snow until the spring. We're completely snowed in. I can get extra supplies air dropped in but us getting out is up to Mother Nature," he explained.

"OK, but I can reach you at this number?"

"As long as the storms aren't interfering with the connection, yes," Dan answered.

"Thank you Mr. Bishop. I'll be contacting you once I find out how the Feds want to handle this."

After signing off Dan looked over to see Willow standing in the doorway watching him. He gave her a smile which she returned. "I just have to send a note to Andrei to fill him in. Can you come over here a minute?"

She approached him and sat on his lap when he indicated he wanted her to sit. He turned on the webcam on the PC and they posed for a quick snapshot. Then he asked her to look into the camera and took a close up of just her face.

"I'm going to send these along to Andrei. The family is going to be very curious about you and Andrei will need the close up for his investigator. I'm going to ask him to have them do some discreet searches based on the information you gave me. One thing you should know, as Andrei is a Russian national, all of my communications with him are very likely monitored by Homeland Security. I'm not worried about it but I just wanted you to know as well. OK?" he asked.

Willow nodded at him with wide eyes. He just smiled at her with wonder at how good she made him feel. He gently pulled her face down to his and kissed her tenderly. She moaned a little and hugged him fiercely. After he returned her hug he had her stand again so he could prepare the email for Andrei. Willow sat on the floor beside his chair and rested her head on his thigh. He was going to protest but she looked so content he turned back to the keyboard. Once he had described the events of the past two days (omitting the racy bits) and included the chronology he'd gotten from Willow he completed the note to Andrei, attached the images and sent it off. He turned back to Willow and ran his fingers through her hair. He felt her purr in pleasure at his touch. He tucked a tablet PC under his arm, helped lift Willow to her feet then they walked back into the kitchen. Dan started the oven, slid the pizza inside, and set the timer. Dan took her hand and they walked into the living room. They sat together on one of the sofas and snuggled under a blanket while they waited for the pizza.

"Speaking of comfortable..." he smiled and continued "I think we'd better order you some clothes and other items you may need."

Willow looked out the window at the continuing blizzard and back at him. "How?" was all she could say.

Dan smiled at her and pulled a tablet PC from under the blanket. "Through the magic of the Internet!" he said with a flourish. All he got for his theatrics was a puzzled expression. "OK, I'll let you in on the secret. We order stuff and get it delivered to my buddy Wally's place. Then he delivers it by air drop in the meadow just past the small forest to the east of the house. Wally's a pilot and enjoys the challenge of precision payload delivery. I'll set up the target and he drops the delivery bundle on it. If he's within 3 feet of the target I owe him a beer. If not, he owes me one."

Willow was still looking at him like he was a little nuts so he just flipped on the tablet and proceeded to load up the webpage for an online clothing retailer. First he had to figure out her size. He found the help page and saw how he needed to determine her measurements.

He gave Willow the tablet and rushed off to the workshop where he grabbed a cloth tape measure. Granted it had a one hundred foot spool and was used for more industrial purposes but it would work. He grabbed the pencil and pad on the way back to Willow and asked her to stand. Using the tape measure he recorded her measurements on the pad and Willow had a good giggle at how flustered Dan got when he had to measure her for a bra.

Now that he had the details out of the way Dan took Willow through the webpages where she could see the clothes. Dan watched her face to see if she liked any of the clothes but when she didn't react to any of them he started to suspect she didn't realize what they were doing.

"Willow, do you understand I want to buy you some clothes? Have you ever gone shopping for clothes?" he asked.

She glanced at him and shook her head.

"So people just brought you clothes and you wore them whether you liked them or not?" he asked.

She nodded but had a puzzled look on her face.

"OK, I'd like you to try imagining yourself in one of the outfits you see on this page and let me know which one you think might look good on you and be nice to have."

Willow looked at the models on the page and turned her eyes back to him. "Which ones do you like?" she asked.

That stopped him short. He realized that she couldn't make this kind of decision. She'd been basically a living dress up doll for quite possibly most of her life and only wore clothes at the whim of her 'masters' to please them.

Well, he wasn't going to make her feel bad about it now. He turned his eyes back to the page and studied what the models were wearing. He finally clued in that he had no idea how to dress a woman. Guys were easy; undershirt, shirt, underwear, pants, socks and you're done. Mixing and matching? Please. He needed help. Female help.

He heard a chirping and realized he had an incoming call on the PC. He got up again and hustled into the communications room. Willow was right behind him. He sat and she sunk to kneel next to his chair. He suppressed his annoyance as her reaction might just be an automatic reaction for her. He'd talk to her about it later. Dan answered the call and Kira Noskov's face appeared on the screen. At her elbow was her youngest daughter, Katya. The picture was choppy as the signal was weak but that didn't diminish the brilliance of the woman's smile as she greeted him.

"Hello Daniel! We received your message and I wanted to call you immediately to congratulate you two! You make a beautiful couple! I've been telling you for years to find yourself a woman. You've finally taken my advice!" she laughed.

Dan realized that Kira read more into the photo he'd sent of Willow sitting on his lap than he'd intended. He looked down at Willow and saw the smile on her face and knew he couldn't try to explain it now. "Thank you Kira! And hello Katya!"

"Svetlana is crying, DanDan. She is not happy," Katya said, using her pet name for him.

Kira looked pained then apologetic. "Not to worry Daniel, Svetlana has been holding onto her hero worship too long. She will grow from this and her tears will dry."

Dan's expression froze and twitched as he realized he'd fucked up again and hurt the young girl unintentionally. He knew she'd had a crush on him. They had a strong bond from what they'd gone through together. "Oh god, I'm so sorry. I never meant to hurt her." His PTSD surfaced with a series of twitches.

Kira's voice grew firm, "Daniel, stop this. You are NOT responsible for Svetlana's happiness or tears." She turned to Katya and said something quietly to the girl who vanished out of the frame. Willow got worried at Dan's stricken expression so she stood and took his face in her hands and turned his face to hers so she could look into his eyes. He was slightly dazed but his eyes came back into focus when they were looking into the vibrant green depths of Willow's eyes. He heaved a sigh and came back to the present.

Kira witnessed the transformation with a satisfied smile on her face. There were tears in the corners of her eyes as she saw her friend pulled back from an attack. She was convinced that this young woman was just the medicine her Daniel had been missing all of these years. She didn't approve of his self-imposed solitude but he hadn't listen to her protests. She didn't know anything else about this woman but she was good for him, this much she knew.

Svetlana appeared in the picture and took in the shaken expression on Dan's face and the beautiful woman holding him. Her jealousy flared terribly to see another woman touching Dan. She'd vowed she'd marry him so many years ago when he'd saved her and her family. But she couldn't bear the thought that she'd caused him pain. Above all else she knew the scars he carried from that day and how long he'd struggled with them.

"D-Daniel! I am so pleased to see you looking well! Please know that I am well and happy for you! Do not worry about me! I have many friends here and many boyfriends- I mean many who would like to be my boyfriend!" she corrected herself before her mother could protest. She looked at the annoyed expression on her mother's face then gave Daniel one more forced smile and left the picture."